Our Lives are Over
by Opal-Mermaid
Summary: A time for reflection Small TW for mentions of death and self-harm.


_**Guilt**_

_Noun_

_A feeling of having committed wrong or failed in an obligation._

Piper felt guilty. She had for the past 17 months. She'd counted each day as her guilt consumed her; felt the minutes etch into her skull when she couldn't sleep and prayed that those images, the ones that haunt her, one day finally fade away. But they don't. The guilt remains and she feels it in the cold pit of her stomach and in the sweat of her palms. Piper will never overcome her guilt and although she tries to accept it there's nothing to stop it from coming back like an angry demon desperate to drive her mad.

She sits in her cell, picking at food that never tastes right, trying to stay alive for reasons lost to her months ago. She remembers being feisty, remembers good times and pleasant memories that instead of filling her with a warmth fill her with dread and unending sadness – a sadness too strong to put into words. She feels it scratching at her throat and stabbing behind her eyes when she lays awake in the dark. She feels it bubbling in her stomach and making her sick as she tries to not think about the catastrophe she has brought upon all of Atmosia.

She likes to work. She knows it's slave labour. She knows the physical torture is painful and she should fight her captors, but she doesn't. This is what she deserves. Piper knows she belongs here in the pits of depravity among killers and maniacs to at least try to atone for what she's done. The work distracts her emotionally for a little while, once she focuses hard, once she blocks out the sounds of engines and steam, she can concentrate of her crystals like a mad scientist and she can forget, for the briefest of seconds, that she doesn't deserve happiness.

Some nights are worse than others. At the beginning, when the wounds were still fresh, Piper would find herself screaming through the night, howling in a pain too deep in her core to explain. No amount of bandages could fix what had caused her agony. Her tears dried up, her throat swollen and raw, her nails bitten to the quick. She was a mess and would have preferred a swift death than to see the face of the man who took everything from her. Although his smirk was long gone the Dark Ace still loomed over her like a shadow, day and night, his very presence filled her with a burning anger – but she was too far gone, too broken to lash out anymore.

She had accepted her fate. The fate of the Atmos. She ignored the small rumours of uprisings – and she was right to do so. All failed.

Sky Knights were killed.

Crews disbanded.

Ships destroyed.

It was a complete take over that seemed to happen all too quickly, Terra after Terra overthrown by Cyclonian troops - rebel forces cut down before they could even stand. Cyclonis wanted no Sky Knight left alive and she meant it. To add to her guilt Piper had witnessed the execution of Sky Knights she once knew. Ones she once revered and once whose crew were screaming for them. Screaming for mercy.

And she was forced to live with their screams echoing in her ears and in her nightmares. Their faces, contorted with fear, malice and grief were a constant reminder that she was the one who did this. A murderer by proxy. Their blood on her hands. Piper had tried to overcome her grief several times in the early days of her capture; tried to fight it and resist it, but the memories never go away and when someone spoke his name she would break down within seconds.

Not only did Piper allow Cyclonis to win, she had watched her friend, her family, get cut down and fall to the abyss.

Removing her goggles, she allowed herself a small moment to think – currently she didn't know where the rest of her old squadron were. Was Finn living the life on Terra Tropica? Was Junko with other wallops who accepted him? Was Stork at peace living a life of cleanliness? Or perhaps were they all dead? Had she killed them all too? Were they here, on Cyclonia, being tortured and punished? Had she doomed them to a life of misery and suffering? She wasn't sure she wanted to find out.

The crystals she had been tasked to look at were boring, they had been since she got here – it was almost laughable – she used to dream of a job where she could investigate, monitor and experiment with crystals. And now she loathed it. Her existence here was meaningless and yet her guilt wouldn't let her die. She watched a small red crystal spin on a metal axis as she scoffed at her own mind's foolishness – death was too sweet a punishment for what she had done.

Returning to her bed Piper once again allowed her guilt to consume her, although she no longer screamed, and no tears would fall, her heart would ache and her skin would itch at all the memories that came flooding back without hesitation. Closing her eyes all she could see was the face of a young, fiery red head who lost to the world all too soon. His infectious laughter once brought her happiness and joy, his charming smile and charismatic ways used to cause her to blush in foolish ways.

Oh how she missed him.

She missed them all. Thinking of them only brought more pain and she tried to rid her mind of everything; she'd attempted all kinds of distractions – work, self-harm, drawing, singing – anything to try and force her mind to focus on something else. But in the dead of the night, when her body demanded sleep, they would flood her like a raging river, thrashing and stinging her. One mistake cost her the world, cost her family their lives and so, so many people were living a hellish existence because of her.

If only she hadn't called his name. If only she had fought her own attackers harder. If only, if only, if only, _if only._ And she screamed and tore her hair out with all the thoughts of 'if only' – hindsight is a torturous thing.

And so Piper lay in her cell on Cyclonia; drowning in her guilt as it consumed her.


End file.
